OPINION:
The big debate story in early summer was, of course, the performance of President Biden against former President Donald Trump. His rambling presence led to a sudden halt to his reelection campaign and his deferral to his vice president to replace him on the Democratic ticket as presidential nominee.
Though unabashedly presenting the news through a liberal filter every day, CNN anchors Jay Tapper and Dana Bash were praised by Mr. Trump as being fair to him in the July debate.
But in February, another debate occurred before a special election in a pivotal New York congressional district. This election had been called to fill the vacancy created by the expulsion of veracity-challenged Rep. George Santos, a Republican. Though the special election itself drew national media attention, this debate between the Republican and Democratic candidates did not.
To its credit, News 12 Long Island sponsored the debate between Democratic former Rep. Tom Suozzi and Republican Nassau County legislator Mazi Pilip.
Mr. Suozzi had represented the 3rd District, which traverses eastern New York City and northern Nassau County, for three terms until he challenged Gov. Kathy Hochul in the 2022 Democratic primary. Ms. Pilip, a veteran of the Israeli military, had won her county government election in a Democratic district.
In recent weeks, however, I was alerted to Mr. Suozzi’s faux pas on gun control in the debate.
Fortunately, News 12 provides access to the entire February debate. I watched it. My source was correct: Mr. Suozzi advanced misinformed and arguably authoritarian positions that were never challenged in the debate or by news organizations covering the discussion.
Namely, an audience member asked a question about guns during the program. Ms. Pilip said that she opposed automatic weapons (which have long been illegal nationwide) and “weapons of war.”
Mr. Suozzi then pounced, declaring that “semiautomatic weapons are the problem.” He hectored her with his view that “semiautomatics are the problem” and demanded, “Will you vote to ban semiautomatic weapons?”
How could a former member of Congress who takes credit for co-sponsoring major gun control bills in his previous six years in the House reveal such ignorance on an issue where he touts his leadership?
The National Shooting Sports Federation notes that the vast majority of the 400 million legally owned rifles and handguns in the country are semiautomatic, meaning they do not need to be reloaded after every shot. Yet somehow Mr. Suozzi, who also served as a mayor and county executive, was unaware of this, demanding a ban on the most popular legal guns in our nation.
In an era where some politicians casually accuse their opponents of “threatening democracy,” it’s worth considering how potentially authoritarian Mr. Suozzi’s proposals could be.
If all semiautomatic weapons should be banned, would Mr. Suozzi achieve this by diverting federal agents from their serious work into disarming Americans who legally own popular guns?
Should federal law enforcement go to the homes of retired law enforcement officers to confiscate their legal guns? That could compel confrontations between former police officers and their erstwhile federal compatriots. How about battered wives who gained orders of protection but keep guns to protect their children and themselves? Or other law-abiding Americans who possess guns, as is their Second Amendment right?
What could be more antidemocratic than confiscating and declaring illegal the constitutionally protected weapons of law-abiding Americans?
Although I donated to Ms. Pilip’s congressional campaign, I have no animus against Mr. Suozzi and have never met him. I admired his Wall Street Journal op-ed in which he explained his opposition to removing Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, to avoid a repeat of the chaos that plagued Congress early last year. On other issues, Mr. Suozzi is not the most radical elected Democrat in New York these days.
Perhaps most amazing in this saga is the lack of news coverage of this pivotal debate and special election. To my knowledge, no Long Island, New York City or national news organization reported on Mr. Suozzi’s shocking desire to ban semiautomatic weapons nationwide.
Daily News columnist Harry Siegel mentioned the debate’s exchange on guns but never commented on the obvious strongman implications of Mr. Suozzi’s proposals.
My hypothesis is that many reporters and editors (especially in the Northeast) have never sought to understand the Second Amendment and gun issues.
To at least some of them, the distinctions between an automatic, semiautomatic, single-shot or even ancient blunderbuss guns are unimportant. Guns are a de facto scourge to them.
What should Americans demand in this autumn’s coverage of the presidential and congressional campaigns?
1. Journalists should educate themselves and understand at least the general differences among types of legal and illegal guns.
2. When a candidate suggests banning any category of weapon, reporters should ask how the candidate would achieve his goal. Would he favor federal raids on the homes of law-abiding citizens?
3. News outlets covering the campaign in New York’s 3rd Congressional District should ask Mr. Suozzi how he would achieve his ban on semiautomatic weapons.
If Mr. Suozzi wants to explain that he misspoke in February and that he now recognizes that our Constitution protects the ownership of nonautomatic firearms, that would be welcome. He would be removing himself from the ranks of those who are “threatening democracy.”
• Herbert W. Stupp was commissioner of the NYC Department for the Aging from 1994 to 2002. Early in his career, his work won an Emmy for best editorial in the New York television market.
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